Silent Voices
by EWriting
Summary: Peeta lives a life of unthinking comfort in the Capitol. Rebels and revolution are someone else's problem. Until his family is granted an Avox and everything he thought he knew about sacrifice and love changes.
1. Chapter 1 THE AVOX

Peeta was at school when the Avox arrived.

Of course, his mother had been talking about its arrival for weeks and what it meant for their family. Or more to the point, to her career. The honor. The prestige. The faith in their political loyalty. Peeta had tuned most of it out. Frankly, he tuned out most of what his mother said. But he still knew that the new arrival was coming today; he just wasn't sure how he felt about it.

Of course, he'd seen Avoxes before. Like most people in the Capitol, he'd observed them in the shopping centres and entertainment complexes, trailing behind their masters, burdened with packages and doing their bidding. And whenever his parents had hosted a dinner party, they'd rented them, eager for the prestige the ghostly red servers granted.

But he'd never actually spoken to one until the moment he arrived home and found himself face-to-face with the pale, trembling Avox who'd been bound in perpetuity to the Mellark family for crimes against the Capitol.

The apartment was empty. His mother was at her administrative job in the justice service. She was a press liaison, scheduling executions and public punishments like floggings for broadcast. His father was rarely home these days. It took time and effort to remain as perpetually addicted as he did. And his brothers were both at work: Rye at the gamemaker's complex, gleefully devising new tortures for the next hapless round of competitors and his brother Bran at the Peacekeeper's training facility, where he was two years into his three years of service training.

The Avox was standing, motionless, by the apartment's floor to ceiling windows, her eyes fixed with unnatural intensity on the marble tile of the living room and so he was able to study her in detail. She was tiny, and the boxy red garments that identified her as a traitor hung on her near skeletal frame. Clearly, her retraining had not been an easy one. She was also younger than he'd expected. Not that he'd ever seen an _old_ Avox – they didn't tend to have a long lifespan, not with the treatment that most of their owners meted out – but those he had seen were usually older than him. In their twenties, at least. But this girl didn't look much older than him, although she was so thin, and her features so pinched, it was hard to be sure. Fifteen maybe, sixteen, if he was forced to guess. Definitely younger than eighteen. It surprised him though. What could someone so young have done to deserve such a fate?

He moved slowly towards her, his hands open, trying to seem unthreatening. Closer, he could see a fine network of scars marking her face and neck, travelling beneath the wide red collar that marked her as an enemy of Panem. She was pale, with dark bruised circles beneath her eyes, but despite this, he could see that her skin was darker than his own, with hints of an olive complexion beneath her unnatural pallor. Her short hair was dark and chopped unflatteringly close to her skull, standing up in myriad directions.

She held herself stiffly, as though prepared for an attack launched from any quarter but her hands, clenched tightly, betrayed her terror. They trembled, making her red cuffs quiver and he felt a dart of pity steal over him, before it was chased away by an overwhelming sense of shame. Wasn't his mother always berating him for his softness?

This girl was a traitor. He had no business feeling sorry for her, not matter how small or how pitiable she appeared. He could almost hear his mother's voice, haranguing him, and he felt his shoulders tighten. He had to force himself to breath.

 _He wasn't his mother. He wasn't his mother. Her views weren't his_.

God, if only that were true!

"Hello," he said at last, when the silence had gotten too oppressive for him to bear. "I'm Peeta." He paused awkwardly, wondering what else he could say to reassure her that he meant no harm. She didn't respond, didn't lift her eyes from the floor,

"Can you hear me?" He felt dumb even asking but if she couldn't hear, how would she be able to serve their family? He knew they couldn't speak, of course. But he'd never met an Avox who was deaf. "Can you…?"

One swift jerk of her chin, up and down, interrupted his questioning.

 _OK, that answered that question. She's not deaf_.

"Has my mother explained your duties? Do you know what's expected of you? Has she shown your sleeping quarters?"

 _Yes¸_ her chin replied jerkily. _Yes. No._

"Would you…would you like me to show you? I won't…I won't hurt you."

A pause, her eyes fixed intently on her hands. _Yes._

Carefully, as though any sudden movements might startle her into flight, Peeta led her through the apartment, down the hall, towards the tiny space where she would rest. It wasn't a room. In fact, before the Avox had been assigned to them, it had been a closet where his mother had stored her off-season fashions. She'd complained mightily about the inconvenience but the allure of their very own slave had finally convinced her to make the sacrifice. Now, there was just enough room for a single mattress, and a hook for the red clothes. No shelves. No books. No pictures. The single bare bulb cast an unrelenting light over the unwelcoming space and Peeta was momentarily ashamed. His room was ten times as large, with every comfort imaginable. How could anyone sleep in such a dreary, oppressive cell?

But the Avox didn't seem to share his discomfort. She crouched down and pressed her hand against the thin pad, seemingly content with its meagre support. She swung the door back and forth, clearly testing its sturdiness.

"Is this OK?"

At his soft-spoken question, the Avox looked up. And finally, she looked at him.

Peeta felt his heart give a weird, frantic lurch when her eyes met his and for a moment, he wondered if was having some sort of an attack. Asthma or panic or something. He felt odd, light-headed even, but the Avox just continued to look at him.

Assessing him.

Considering him.

As though he were the servant and she was the one with all the control.

Her eyes were gray. Wide, clear and so expressive that Peeta would swear he could almost hear her thoughts. Her face revealed nothing. It was a blank, like an empty holovid screen. But her eyes were something else entirely. As he gazed into her eyes, so many emotions swirled within them, he wasn't sure he could identify them all. _Fear_. Fear of the unknown. Fear of him. Fear for her life. _Anger._ A roiling, bone-deep anger that nearly made him 'd wondered earlier what such a young girl could have done to have earned the enmity of the administration. But looking into her eyes, he no longer wondered. These were the eyes of someone who would dare anything. Do anything. But worse of all, was the grief. A grief so profound, so all encompassing, it nearly took his breath away. His life was safe, sheltered and if he had any unhappiness, they were petty and transitory. But this girl's grief was beyond his comprehension. She had lost something so precious to her, so intrinsic to her sense of self, it was a miracle her heart was still beating.

And without thinking, acting on the impulse that so often got him in trouble, he reached out and touched her dry, papery skin, cradling her cheek and running his thumb across the pale network of scars as though his touch could erase them.

"My god, what have they done to you?"


	2. Chapter 2 MELLARK FAMILY DINNER

She froze, standing stock still at his touch. Her eyes revealed her terror and her confusion and Peeta wanted to curse at his stupidity, even as the warmth of her face touched his palm.

He didn't know exactly what they did to traitors during their reconditioning but he'd heard rumours at school and overheard Bran and Rye, laughing at the punishments meted out to the hapless fools who'd dared to challenge the power of Panem. Becoming an Avox wasn't a reward, like being a Hunger Games victor, it was simply death deferred. Because the price of escaping an immediate end meant giving up your identity, having your name and your history obliterated as though you had never existed. And while Peeta didn't know what the failure for complying was, for expressing the least bit of personality, he knew enough about the world he lived in to know that treating her like this, of asking about her past, put her life in danger. For this Avox, his sympathy wasn't a kindness, it was tantamount to calling the peacekeepers and having her shot on sight.

"I'm sorry," he said, backing slowly away. "I spoke out of turn."

The Avox looked at him expressionlessly. _She must think I'm a spy, testing her loyalty. Stupid, Peeta, stupid._

"I won't bother you again," he promised, before turning and fleeing to the safety of his bedroom and leaving the Avox to her own devices.

Soon, it was as though she'd always been there. Days turned to weeks and Peeta tried his hardest to ignore her as she slipped round the periphery of his life but it was hard. His eyes were drawn to her and he'd find himself standing, watching, as she went about her work like a silent red shadow. At night, he'd find his mind wandering to her, thinking about her sleeping just down the hall. And the dreams – he blushed, thinking of the fragments of his fantasies that lingered, even in his waking moments.

He'd like to lay the blame for his fantasies to his age and his inexperience, but he knew that wasn't why he'd chosen to reach the near-freakish age of sixteen still a virgin. His brothers had both thrown off that unfashionable burden years ago, and indulged their tastes at Avox brothels and sex-mutt shops. But despite their teasing – Bran had even unearthed a thick, old-fashioned book called a Bible, and made noises about Peeta's fear of sin – he just wasn't comfortable exploiting another person – or mutt – that way.

He just kept his head down and dreamt of the day until he'd be old enough to leave. He'd turn eighteen in less than two years. 561 days and counting.

Tonight, he was enduring the family's weekly dinner – a pretense that his mother liked to enforce with a view of collecting anecdotes that she could trot out to her superiors as proof of the Mellark family's unity and wholesomeness. Of course, if the government ever reviewed the cameras they had installed in all of the private homes, they'd know the truth. Or, as Peeta sometimes suspected in his rare cynical moments, Snow already knew the truth but the deception pleased him and suited the government's purpose.

He played with a piece of fish, drawing it through the thick sauce in a complicated pattern, trying to get up the will to eat it. He'd never liked the taste but his mother insisted on paying a premium for seafood, insisting that only the stuff imported from District Four met her discerning palette.

 _Up and down and loop-de-loop_. The tines scrapped obnoxiously against the china and his mother glared in his direction.

"Honestly, anyone would think you'd been raised in the districts," his mother carped, pointing a well-manicured nail down the table in his direction.

Peeta didn't think he'd been doing anything especially grievous but experience told him the safest policy with his mother was a pre-emptive apology. "I'm sorry. I'll do better."

His mother scoffed but since her cutlery was still in her hands and not flying through the air towards his head, he figured habit and not a more overt malice were behind her criticism. Grateful for small mercies, he ducked his head and applied his efforts to the rest of his plate, letting the conversation flow over him.

"And at the last planning meeting, Seneca said that my work on the muttations was the best he'd seen since he took over three years ago," Rye boasted. "Mark my words, you'll see my work in the arena this year! I can't wait to see what the career bait thinks. I'll bet they piss their ragged little pants. If they're even alive, of course."

"I'm so proud of you," his mother gushed, her anger at her youngest forgotten. "Crane had better watch his back if he knows what's good for him. I'm sure I'll be talking about my son, the gamemaker, before long and Crane will be nothing but a name and date on a future arena."

"Well, I have goals," Rye remarked maliciously. "Unlike some people in this family, _I'm_ not content to just drift along, playing with crayons and making arts and crafts." Peeta's lack of enthusiasm for a concrete plan for his post-school career was another bone of contention with his family, and yet another way he fell short. The counsellors had been stymied. They'd given him a battery of tests and while his verbal skills were advanced, his only other marketable skill seemed to be his drawing and there was no way he was going into muttation design or aesthetic reconditioning, no matter what his teachers suggested.

Bran laughed at his brother's dig, sending a spray of masticated food towards the table. It was disgusting and Peeta couldn't help but notice his mother's silence. No reprimand for her favourites, as usual.

"Every family has its burden," his mother remarked. "But it's what I get for being sentimental. What was I thinking, having a third? I should have terminated the minute the fetus refused to cooperate for the gender scan. But I'm soft that way. After two boys, I wanted a girl. We could have coordinated our outfits and looked like sisters. Now I'm burdened with a useless dreamer and my body is nothing but a ruined husk. It took them _two hours_ to remove the stretch marks and the incision has never faded completely! Every time I look at my body, I could just cry!"

Peeta'd heard variations on this litany his whole life – although at least tonight, she refrained from criticizing her husband's paltry sexual abilities, perhaps on account of him sitting across the table from her, albeit in a drug induced stupor, so on the whole, he felt he'd gotten off lightly. He stabbed the remaining fillet and shoved it whole into his mouth. He chewed awkwardly, gagging at the taste, but swallowed it down. "I'm done. May I be excused?"

His mother's eyes regarded him with cold distaste but she didn't object. She snapped her fingers and the Avox glided forward. "Clear my son's plate," she ordered. Wordlessly, the slave obeyed. She stopped beside him and Peeta could smell the clean, faintly chemical smell of her skin as she reached past him. He forced himself not to look at her face but he couldn't help watch her hands as they collected his plate and silverware. There was a deep burn on her hand, just starting to scab, and he wondered if she'd gotten it preparing the dinner he'd just forced down.

His mother's voice interrupted his guilt. "I thought you were leaving? Or were you so busy ogling our Avox that you forgot to leave?"

Peeta refused to be cowed. "I have homework. And I wasn't ogling." Except that he had been, after a fashion, and his mother and brothers knew it. God knows what they'd make with that material. They never hesitated to exploit a weakness and his tangled feelings for the red-garbed slave were a weakness indeed.

Bran smirked. "Oh Peeta, I know you're _frustrated._ After all, we do share a wall," his brother said with mock sympathy, his fisted hand ghosting up and down in an unmistakable gesture. "But I don't think even the Avox would want to sleep with you. Even tongueless traitors have standards."

His crude insult infuriated Peeta and made him forget himself. "Don't talk about her that way!"

"Her?" His mother laughed, a light musical trill that Peeta always dreaded. " _It_ , Peeta. _It._ The Avox isn't a person anymore. It's a possession. A tool. A slave. A traitor to be punished. It does what it's told or it is terminated." Her voice was so light, so superficial, it made her statement even more chilling. Because Peeta knew she meant every word. "I don't care what any of you do with it, frankly, as long as it's there when I need it and I can show it off to my friends next week at the reaping party. Do you understand?"

Peeta understood perfectly. Looking at his family one by one, he wondered what it would be like to be have someone, anyone, who actually cared for him. Because his own family certainly didn't. Bran and Rye were laughing at his humiliation. His father was humming to himself, too stoned to object or even know where he was. His mother was cutting her fish into equally sized morsels, her chemically frozen face impassive. The Avox retreated to the kitchen, his dirty dish still in her hands and Peeta could only flee in hot, angry silence to his room.

Once there, he snatched up a sketch pad but he was too angry to draw. The pencil tore through the smooth cotton paper, leaving a jagged, angry line. Everything he touched was ruined! Finally, he retreated to the bathroom where at least if he did cry, it would be muffled by the water.

 _When would he learn? Give them nothing! Show them nothing!_ He punched the buttons in his shower with random fury, not caring whether he smelled of roses or lemongrass, as long as he could wash some of his hurt and his frustration away. He leaned against the cool tiles, letting the scalding water wash over him, and tried to remind himself that tomorrow, there would only be 560 days to go. It didn't help. Nothing helped.

Finally, when his skin was soft and pruned and he was so tired he could barely keep his eyes open, he clambered out and dried off, before pulling on a soft pair of sleeping pants. He walked slowly back to his bed, his feet dragging on the smooth floor.

But when he saw what was waiting for him on his bed, he stopped short in amazement -


End file.
